Dorothy De Navarro (1901–1987) was a lecturer at the University of Cambridge, who specialised in

Anglo-Saxon literature Old English literature refers to poetry and prose written in Old English in early medieval England, from the 7th century to the decades after the Norman Conquest of 1066, a period often termed Anglo-Saxon England. The 7th-century work ''Cædmon ...

Academic career

De Navarro, then Dorothy Hoare, was educated at

Inverness Royal Academy Inverness Royal Academy is a comprehensive secondary school in the city of Inverness in the Highland area of Scotland. A former grammar school with a history dating back to the 13th century, the Academy became a comprehensive in the mid-1970 ...

and took her B.A. at

Aberdeen University , mottoeng = The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom , established = , type = Public research universityAncient university , endowment = £58.4 million (2021) , budget ...

with First Class Honours in English and a gold medal. She took her M.A. in 1923. She earned a

Carnegie Fellowship The Carnegie Corporation of New York is a philanthropic fund established by Andrew Carnegie in 1911 to support education programs across the United States, and later the world. Carnegie Corporation has endowed or otherwise helped to establis ...

from Aberdeen to continue her studies at the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

from 1926 to 1929, residing in

Newnham College Newnham College is a women's constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1871 by a group organising Lectures for Ladies, members of which included philosopher Henry Sidgwick and suffragist campaigner Millicent ...

. She took her PhD from Cambridge in 1929. She worked as an Assistant Lecturer at Cambridge from 1930 to 1932, and was promoted to Lecturer of English from 1932 to 1949. She held positions at Newnham including member of council 1935–1941, 1951–1952 and Secretary 1936–1941. She was an Associate Fellow of Newnham from 1950 to 1952. She was a member of the faculty boards of English, Archaeology and Anthropology from 1936 to 1956. She lectured in early medieval literature. De Navarro supervised Rachel Sheldon Bromwich as an undergraduate, Bomwich would go on to be an academic herself, publishing a "seminal" edition of the Welsh Triads, ''

Trioedd Ynys Prydein The Welsh Triads ( cy, Trioedd Ynys Prydein, "Triads of the Island of Great Britain, Britain") are a group of related texts in Middle Ages, medieval manuscripts which preserve fragments of Welsh folklore, Welsh mythology, mythology and traditiona ...

'', in 1961.

Published works

Hoare published ''The Works of Morris and Yeats on relation to early Saga literature'' (1937), ''Some studies in the Modern Novel'' (1938), and an Introduction to

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born i ...

's ''To the Lighthouse'' (1938). She edited with her husband, ''A.C. Jessup's The Lady of the Winding Stair and other poems'' (1957) and edited her father B.G. Hoare's ''Collection of Poems'' (1950). She also published in journals.

Legacy

The Broadway Trust was established in 1963, to preserve the village of Broadway in the

Cotswolds The Cotswolds (, ) is a region in central-southwest England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and Evesham Vale. The area is defined by the bedrock of Jur ...

where the De Navarro home was located. Their home, Court Farm remains a significant cultural landmark, containing a rare preserved Edwardian garden. De Navarro donated a 1882

platinotype Platinum prints, also called ''platinotypes'', are photographic prints made by a monochrome printing process involving platinum. Platinum tones range from warm black, to reddish brown, to expanded mid-tone grays that are unobtainable in silver ...

cabinet card of Sir Edward Burne-Jones by Frederick Hollyer to the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Personal life

Agnes Dorothy Mackenzie Hoare (known as Dorothy Hoare until her marriage, and thereafter Dorothy De Navarro) was born on 31 July 1901 in

Inverness, Scotland Inverness (; from the gd, Inbhir Nis , meaning "Mouth of the River Ness"; sco, Innerness) is a city in the Scottish Highlands. It is the administrative centre for The Highland Council and is regarded as the capital of the Highlands. Historic ...

. She was the daughter of a draper and his wife. Hoare married Jose Maria “Toty” de Navarro in 1940, a former Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge and lecturer in archaeology. They had one child, Michael de Navarro. Dorothy De Navarro met

Gertrude Caton-Thompson Gertrude Caton Thompson, (1 February 1888 – 18 April 1985) was an English archaeologist at a time when participation by women in the discipline was uncommon. Much of her archaeological work was conducted in Egypt. However, she also worked on ...

, a famed archaeologist while both resided at Cambridge. They became good friends, and shared a house, along with Dorothy's husband “Toty”. After De Navarro retired from teaching, Caton-Thompson moved with the De Navarro family to their home in

Broadway, Worcestershire Broadway is a large village and civil parish in the Cotswolds, England, with a population of 2,540 at the 2011 census. It is in the far southeast of Worcestershire, close to the Gloucestershire border, midway between Evesham and Moreton-in-Marsh ...

in 1956, which would become their shared home until their respective deaths. It would become a popular destination for writers and musicians to visit, as it had been during Toty De Navarro's youth when his mother, the actor Mary Anderson had first lived there. Dorothy De Navarro died in Broadway, Worcestershire in 1987 and was survived by her son, Michael.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:De Navarro, Dorothy 1901 births 1987 deaths Alumni of the University of Aberdeen Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge